Pakistan’s economy…

Pakistan Economy is Booming …

Dr Salman Shah, Pakistan’s minister of finance, MP Shahid Malik, who is also the British minister for international development, Barrister Iftekhar Ahmad, a political analyst as well as former Pakistani senator and Dr. Azeem Malik, who teaches economics at Oxford University, appeared on a GEO programme to discuss Pakistan’s economic condition a while ago. This programme, hosted by Aamir Ghauri, took place when President Musharraf was touring Europe and briefing the European leaders about the Pakistani situation.

To remind the readers, this is the same Aamir Ghauri who, around the same time, also appeared on the UK’s Islam Channel to share with us his anti-Musharraf rhetoric and ramblings. In the Islam Channel programme, Ghauri gleefully nodded his head in agreement while Basharat Ali went on and on challenging pro-Musharraf viewers to give him a “single example” of achievement of the Musharraf government and spoke to the few Musharraf supporting callers in an un-Islamic manner. At that time Ghauri did not have the honesty and the integrity to stop and correct Basharat Ali from making a fool out of himself.

In the above programme, however, Salman Shah offered a corrective of Pakistan’s economic situation and standing. Shah informed the viewers how Pakistan’s economy, under Musharraf, had transformed into a booming and resilient economy despite the political turmoil. Ghauri, quite understandably, seemed upset. So he had Dr. Azeem Malik on his programme as well, whose job, it seems to me, was to oppose whatever Dr. Shah said. Unfortunately for Ghauri, Dr. Shah out manoeuvred Dr. Malik in every instance. Dr. Shah rebutted almost every piece of disinformation presented by Dr. Malik and, interestingly enough, both MP Shahid Malik and Barrister Iftekhar Ahmad AGREED with Dr. Shah (bear in mind that this is a short 10 minute clip of the programme, so we do not see in this segment Mr. Ahmad speaking).

What surprised me was the way Dr. Malik spoke about Pakistan’s economic situation later on in the programme. Dr. Malik is supposed to be a teacher in economics, yet he proceeded to speak most unprofessionally and in a way which does not suit an economist. Based on his comments, it is hard to distinguish Dr. Malik from any average person walking on the streets of Pakistan having little or no clue about economics. To present a few examples, Dr. Malik went on to state that Pakistan’s debt, since 1999, had increased. But an economist is supposed to know that debt is seen in proportion to the economy. So while in 1999 65% of our GDP was used in debt servicing, today around 25% is used for debt servicing. Seen in this proper way, debts have decreased considerably. Dr. Malik also claimed that the U.S. aid played a major role in Pakistan’s economy. But such an assertion is laughable as Dr. Shah correctly pointed out (for a written response, see this paper). Dr. Malik, towards the end of the programme, also stated that Pakistan’s economy was in a bad state because “there is no wheat, wheat prices have increased, there is no electricity” (this is not a verbatim quote; I am only typing from memory) etc. Is this the way how an economist – particularly one teaching at Oxford (!) – is supposed to discuss economy? Dr. Salman Shah was himself taken by surprise by Dr. Malik’s street-talk “analysis” of Pakistan’s economy and proceeded to make important the corrections. [For a written response, see this and this].

It is a pity that the complete programme was not uploaded on youtube. Nonetheless, the above 10 minute segment contains good responses to some common pieces of disinformation floating around on Pakistan’s economy.

See also:

Economic Achievements since 1999

This second brief clip carries out a quick comparison of Pakistan’s economic standing under Nawaz Sharif in 1999 and under President Musharraf.

There can be no doubt that under President Musharraf, Pakistan’s economy has vastly improved. This is the verdict of independent financial institutions such as the Word Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the Asian Development Bank and Merrill Lynch etc. Sadly, this reality is not often presented on the Pakistani media. We still constantly hear on so many TV programmes outright lies such as: “khazana khali hai!” (translation: “the treasury is empty“), “Pakistan’s economy is in a mess and has been destroyed” (lie, while it needs more improvements, it is presently booming and on the rise) etc. These types of lies and false assertions are constantly made by those who hate Musharraf, particularly the members of the belligerent PML-N.

In the coming days we will be exposing a series of lies uttered by Nawaz Sharif in one of his recent interview.

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Yesterday 2nd May 2008 Henry Christopher from United Nations visited Pakistan and saw the progress of Kashmir earth quake areas. He announced that the Kashmir relief operation in the biggest and best accomplished relief operation in the history of United Nations.(All credit goes to President Musharaf and his team.)